Which to use
“lad” and “laud” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #8,307
- “lad” frequency rank
- #47,152
- “laud” frequency rank
- 55459
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | lad | laud |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A boy or young man. | Glorification or praise. |
Where the eye mixes lad and laud
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: lad vs laud
A purely visual mix-up. lad (/læd/) and laud (/lɔːd/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 55459, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
lad is recorded at frequency rank #8,307, classified as anoun, pronounced /læd/. laud is at rank #47,152, tagged as anoun, pronounced /lɔːd/.
Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.
With a confusion score of 55459, this pair ranks #133,481 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of lad vs laud
Shared letters: adl. Private to "lad": -. Private to "laud": u.
"lad" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "laud" · 4 letters · shape CVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- laud ← ladu · laudd · llaud · luad
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "lad" and "laud" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "lad" or "laud" show up more?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "lad" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "laud" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #133,481 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "lad" and "laud" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "laud vs lav". Nearby pair
- Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes
Confusion rank #133,481 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.